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8:03 PM, Friday March 22nd 2024

Honestly I wasn't sure what the issue ultimately was but looking over the work along with your thoughts and critique and re-reviewing the lessons I might be able to shed some light on some of the misunderstandings I was having.

  • Starting off with the linework, there are some things I might not have been doing and it might have been lack of understanding on my part. I can assure I was applying a ghosting method with a large majority of the outline lines, however with the ghosting I would sometimes usually only put one dot for the starting location and not have one for the finishing point. I'm not sure if this might be the cause of the issues you are seeing. As for some of the other chicken scratching if my thoughts are correct on this I think it might be from drawing the intersections of the object. I do admit I'm having a hard time seeing how the intersection will work and redraw the lines a few times and I can see the scratching reviewing my work again.

  • For the ellipses, that may be more from misunderstanding. When Tofu gave the last round of feedback I failed to understand that drawing through the ellipses twice did not just apply to the organic forms but also for the object intersection. Looking through the homework examples I'm not sure how I missed this.

Anyway, looking over everything that is my best estimation on why I'm failing the exercises.

5:17 PM, Saturday March 23rd 2024

It seems that you have done a good job of identifying areas in which your efforts could have been better used. Only plotting one point instead of both, opting for chicken scratching on a situational basis, etc. all suggest that you're following the instructions of the course less intentionally and carefully than you should be, and that you're opting to make adjustments to them. As stressed in Lesson 0 (and I'd recommend you review the video on Lesson 0 Page 3 for this purpose), you need to be making every possible effort to follow the instructions to the letter - especially if you're to make use of the subsidized official critique services we offer, because they only work on the basis of the student doing everything they can to follow those instructions already.

Keep in mind that the form intersections exercise is one that introduces us to the concept of spatial relationships - that's really at the very core of what this course as a whole addresses, and so you are by no means expected to be comfortable with a concept that is worked upon from lessons 3-7 on Lesson 2. Rather what we're doing here is introducing the problem, so as to steer the student as we venture into this territory, and plant the seed that will be cultivated throughout the rest of the course.

You're not going to get the intersections right, and that's okay - but you need to make sure that you are applying all of the steps that have been covered previously in terms of executing each and every mark with care, and your adherence to those instructions should not be loosened in the face of complexity and uncertainty. When you feel uncertain, make sure that at the very least you are nailing what is already clearly defined. That will likely demand more time from you, but that is ultimately what this course demands.

Anyway, review that Lesson 0 material, and it would also probably be a good idea to review your Lesson 1 linework concepts as well. Then do two more pages of form intersections to demonstrate to me that you are able to execute your linework with care, and adhere to those instructions more closely, even in the face of a complex exercise.

4:25 PM, Wednesday March 27th 2024

Alright, I reviewed the lesson materials. Honestly I was doing some other things I should have been. I have also done the revisions as requested

https://imgur.com/a/AmYnRNA

8:57 PM, Thursday March 28th 2024

Your work is better, although there is still plenty of room for improvement. Here are a few things to keep in mind going forward:

  • A lot of your ellipses get more erratic when you draw through them - this can often happen if you're letting yourself slip to drawing them from your elbow or wrist. Keep an eye on that, and whenever you catch yourself slipping, push yourself to draw using your whole arm once more. Over time you'll find yourself doing this less and less. And of course, be sure to apply the ghosting method not just to straight lines, but to your ellipses as well, as it should be applied to all of our freehanded strokes throughout this course.

  • Your use of hatching isn't great, especially on your cylinders - you seem to be placing the lines very arbitrarily. For now, I think it's better that you leave the hatching out from your cylinders, which would also be more in line with these notes on hatching from the form intersections instructions.

  • Keep pushing yourself to draw your spheres with circles - meaning, avoid drawing those ellipses to be narrow. Again, this is something that will demand more use of your shoulder, as the wider the ellipse gets the harder it is to draw successfully from your elbow or wrist.

  • You don't appear to be paying as much attention to how your edges are oriented when drawing your boxes, which is leading to cases where sets of edges diverge as they move farther away from the viewer, instead of converging. This causes those boxes to look wonky. To this point, I'd recommend that you review the 3 new videos that were introduced for the box challenge last month, as they discuss how we "resolve our corners" when constructing those boxes. Reviewing that material will help ensure that you practice them correctly going forward, both in your warmups and in the other exercises where boxes come up.

As a whole, you've improved over the previous set and have moved in the direction of addresses the issues I'd called out. I am still concerned that you need to give yourself more time to consider both the instructions from the lesson material as well as what may have been raised in past feedback you've received, and I can see signs that you may understand/apply concepts when they're raised to your attention, but that they may then slip out of mind going forward, causing the issues to arise again. Remember that with our limited resources, we don't have the capacity to hold students' hands as much as other more expensive courses might - so a great deal will still fall to you to ensure you're applying the information you're given not just when you receive it, but into the long term so it can have a meaningful impact.

I'm going to have Tofu mark this lesson as complete, but note that what I've called out here is something you're still going to have to put a fair bit of work into addressing as you continue forwards through the course.

8:58 PM, Thursday March 28th 2024

Marking this lesson complete, but be sure to refer to Uncomfortable's feedback.

Next Steps:

Continue addressing the points Uncomfortable raised in his feedback, but go ahead and move onto Lesson 3.

This critique marks this lesson as complete.
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